


The Women of Qumar

by victoria_p (musesfool)



Category: Firefly
Genre: F/F, West Wing Title Project
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-01-07
Updated: 2008-01-07
Packaged: 2017-10-03 03:23:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesfool/pseuds/victoria_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nandi was the first person Inara loved.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Women of Qumar

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to luzdeestrellas for looking it over. Written for the [**West Wing title project**](http://musesfool.livejournal.com/1487052.html).

Nandi wears the scent of sex like a perfume; it clings to her skin beneath the jasmine-scented soap she bathes in, the rice powder and cosmetics with which she paints her face. Inara likes to tuck her face into the crook of Nandi's neck and inhale, likes to lick it off Nandi's golden, glowing skin, little cat-licks that make Nandi squirm and sigh.

They've been taught the performance of sex in class since they were sixteen, but this is no act--they've been taught to give and receive pleasure and that's what they're doing now. Inara lavishes attention on the full sweep of Nandi's lips, the lush curves of her breasts and hips, the liquid heat between her thighs, parted so Inara can lie between them to lick and suck and tease until Nandi comes apart beneath her hands and mouth.

Nandi is the first person Inara's loved since she stepped through the ornately gilded doors of the Companion Academy five years ago.

Nandi pets and teases her, teaches and protects her, makes her happy in ways Inara had thought possible only in fairy stories and books.

They are the brightest stars in their class, the future of House Madrassa, women who will go on to serve and influence the most powerful men and women in the Alliance. They are clever and beautiful, wise and generous.

They have been cultivated like the hothouse flowers in the conservatory, caged like the elusive butterflies in the atrium.

It's everything Inara's ever wanted--direction, purpose, the chance to learn and grow and hone her skills. She blossoms like the rarest orchid, shines like brightly polished silver, reflecting hundreds of years of tradition.

Nandi rebels, unhappy with conformity, and chafing at the rules that bind their lives. She's cut loose, pruned away like a vine growing in the wrong direction.

"_Jiě jie_," Inara says, blinking back tears with heavily mascara'd lashes, always, always aware of appearances, "must you go?" She desperately wants to pull Nandi into her arms, curl up with her under the lavishly embroidered quilts on their bed and pretend none of this has happened. She wants to slap Nandi's face until she understands how much her defection is hurting Inara.

"I'll be fine, _mèi mei,_" Nandi says, mouth curving in a half-smile Inara recognizes as part determination and part regret. "And so will you."

Nandi kisses her and touches her cheek gently, then walks out of the academy with her head held high. She doesn't look back.

Inara cries quietly into her pillow that night, and has to use all her cosmetics skills to hide the puffy redness of her eyes in the morning.

No one speaks of Nandi; it's as if she never existed, except for the hole she left in Inara's life. Inara refuses to let it be filled, though other girls try. She smiles and flirts and becomes the toast of Sihnon, but she doesn't fall in love again.

Nandi is the first person to break Inara's heart, and Inara's determined that she'll be the last.

end

~*~


End file.
